09 Feb 2020
We had a great start, the tour operator pick us up on time. The tour guide (Omme apologies for the misspelling) gave us an introduction about the tour while going to see the death railway bridge on the river Kwai. Everything was well explained in detail so when we arrived on the first stop at the Kanchanabury war cemetery we had sufficient time to walk around. The second stop was at River Kwai Museum, here Omme explained the history and why the construction of the museum was needed. Inside there are few portraits describing the prisoners living condition. After the museum we continued our journey by long tail boat on the river Kwai to the death railway bridge. So far the trip was going well, we reached the death railway bridge where we had the opportunity to walk on it and visit the prisoners campus. A this point we supposed to ride the train for 1 hour and 30 mimutes to admire the scenery and to have an idea how the bridge was built. Unfortunately we were told that the train had some issue with the engine and the departure will be delayed or cancelled. At this point Omme advised to reach the destinatin by the minivan but we had to wait for the driver, who had driven halfway to the train destination point Tham Krasea, to pick us up. Of course we were behind schedule and everything was rushed to make up the time. Before arriving at the death railway bridge we had a lunch at the restaurant proposed by the tour operator. It supposed to be an authentic thai lunch but it was a disaster. The food was cold and overcooked kind of ready meal taste. Nevertheless, we restart our journey to the last destination Tham Krasea. We could only spend no more than 30 minutes to walk on the rail track and see the cave. Surprisingly, walking back to go to the cave we were told to move away from the railway as the train was approaching!
Afterwards everyone was back in the minivan where the driver drove as back to Bangkok. As everything was so behind schedule we were left in the vicinity of the hotel instead at the hotel as stipulated in the tour guide. It was a shame as this tour does have a great potential but they need to take into account of potential delays.